by Alton Gansky
I looked at his eyes, saw the direction he was looking, and turned to face whatever bogeyman was coming our way. I crouched, fist clinched into tight balls of flesh and bone.
No bogeyman. Just fog. Just gray, rolling, thick, smoke-like fog. And it terrified me.
Then I saw what the kid must have seen: something in the fog. Not just in the fog, but swimming in it like a person might swim in the ocean—only better, and faster. It was like watching dolphins swimming in the sea; dolphins with big heads, big mouths, sharp teeth and claws on the end of spindly arms. They looked hungry, fast and mean.
I stood welded to the deck. My brain refused to believe what I was seeing while my heart said I had dealt with these things in the past and it wasn’t good.
“Inside!” Daniel was the one that said that. I tried to say it when I first caught a glimpse of those things, but my mouth wouldn’t work.
“Everyone this way.” I used the fire ax to point down the deck to where a door way led to the theater I had been in earlier.
No one argued with Daniel’s advice or my direction. They ran next to the superstructure; I stayed between them and a fog that seemed to somehow gain speed. It was as if those things could move the fog bank at will.
It was only twenty or thirty feet to the doorway, but it seemed like a two-mile sprint. My heart was like a wild, captive animal trying to break free of a cage. I felt the chill of a cold sweat and I had to remind myself to breathe. This was industrial-strength fear.
A glance to the side revealed what I didn’t want to see. The fog was closer and closing in on us at an unbelievable rate.
It was twenty feet out.
Fifteen feet.
It was at the railing. A hideous corpse-like face poked out of the wall of fog. I swear it was smiling or leering. It had the expression of a starving man looking at a plate of steak and potatoes.
The fog poured over the rail.
“Faster!” My voice rebounded off the fog on the one side and the metal wall on the other. Don’t ask me to explain that. I’m no physicist, and frankly I don’t care.
Another face. Then three. Five. Twenty. The wall of fog turned into a sneering mass of faces, each chomping at the air.
One face disappeared, then reappeared followed by its stringy body. It was headed for Andi.
She screamed. I yelled and put on the breaks. The thing was graceful in the fog, but outside the fog it was more like a trout flopping around in a rowboat.
That was a mistake on my part. It couldn’t swim in simple air. I guess it needed the fog for that, but the thing could scramble pretty good.
It grunted, snapped, and headed for Andi.
I had the ax.
I used it.
I doubted killing things is my style. Guilt filled me as I put the ax in motion, but there was no time for self-reflection—even if I could remember more of my past. I made an appointment to talk all this over with myself when we reached safety. If we were ever safe.
The ax did its job. It was like hitting a cantaloupe. The creature’s bold choice to leave the safety of the fog hadn’t worked out like it planned, but that didn’t stop others from trying. They might be fearsome, but they weren’t any too smart. Each one that sprang from the fog hit the deck pretty hard. That would all change in about thirty seconds because the fog had just passed the rail. Only five feet or so separated us from it and the horrors it held.
One of the overly eager critters leapt from the deck and reached for Daniel. It caught the kid by the collar, but his claws missed any flesh. Daniel screamed that scream again and the coals of anger and fear in me burst into flame.
I bolted that way, then heard another scream. Not one of fear, but fury. A woman’s voice. An angry mother’s kind of scream. Brenda had the creature by the back of the neck and yanked it off Daniel before it could bring claw or tooth to bear. Then Brenda slammed the thing face-first into the deck. I knew she was furious because she slammed its head several times to drive home the point.
It stopped moving. I glanced back to the other creatures and saw those on the deck back up a few feet. I don’t think they’ve ever seen anyone like Brenda do in one of their own.
Their caution evaporated a moment later. Short memories, I guess. The momentary pause was all we needed. I sprinted to the one closest to our party and gave it a sample of my shoe. It felt like I had kicked a ragdoll. It flew down the deck like one.
“Get in. Get in.” Grumpy—Chad—had reached the door and opened it. The guy was full of surprises. I had him pegged to be one of those guys who scream like a little girl and do everything they can to save themselves.
I couldn’t have been more wrong. He held the door open, held it in its place with his shoulder, turned to the mass of hungry murderers and tensed like a man about to take on a barroom full of bikers.
Daniel crossed the threshold first, followed by Brenda, then Andi.
“Move it, Tank.”
I didn’t need the encouragement. The moment I was through the door I spun back to the opening, grabbed Chad by the back of his shirt and yanked. He stumbled in and I grabbed the knob and pulled the door shut, but not before one of the little monsters got his grubby mitt between the door and the jamb. I closed it anyway. I closed it hard, putting all my weight and strength behind it.
A scream came from the other side of the door. I don’t know if it was a scream of anger, frustration, or immense pain. I didn’t spend much time thinking about it.
“Into the theater.” Chad was again holding open a door. “Bring the ax.”
I did and plunged past him. The door he held open was one of two. The entrance to the theater was through the set of double doors I had seen my first time in the room.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Save it. Those things might figure out how to open a door.” He was leaning back, a hand on each U-shaped handle. “Use the ax.”
“You want me to chop—”
“No. Put the ax handle through the door handles. We need to barricade these.”
I did as he said. After all, it was a good idea.
We checked for other doors, found the other pair of double entrance/exit doors, and used one of the metal cymbal stands from the drum kit to keep those doors from opening out.
A brief thought occurred to me. “You’d think they would have a way to lock these doors until they were ready to let people in.”
“There are a lot of things about this ship that are off. That’s the least egregious.”
“Something else I can’t argue with.” I moved to the windows. I did so because I thought it was wise. I really had no desire to look outside.
The windows were covered with thick curtains to keep out the sun during performances and maybe to keep passengers from peering in. Chad joined me. The women and Daniel had moved as far from the doors as possible.
Deep breath, then I pulled the curtain back. A mass of milky-white faces was pressed against the glass. So many ugly faces.
They were licking the window. I closed the curtains and bent over, resting my hands on my knees.
“You going to hurl again?” Since it was Chad speaking I expected a little more mockery, but he sounded almost concerned.
“Nah. I’m just trying to—I don’t know. I just need a moment.”
When I straightened I got a good look in Chad’s eyes. There was fear, but there was something else.
“You did good out there, Tank. You saved a life or two. Maybe all our lives.”
“You done good too, buddy, holding that door and all. You’re quick on your feet.” I slapped him on the shoulder.
The girls and Daniel were seated on the floor of the stage. Brenda held Daniel like she was afraid he’d run away.
We walked to where they were seated.
Brenda looked up. “Now what?”
I had no idea what to tell her.
Then she—all of them—were gone.
Chapter 12
BACK IN THE CLOSET
LAST
TIME I got shuffled I ended up on the stage of the ship’s small theater. Before that, I landed on the main deck where I left a pool of biology, something Chad hadn’t let me forget. This time I was in a pitch- dark compartment.
“Swell. Jus’ swell.” I had landed on my fanny, which isn’t all that comfortable for big guys like me. I put my arms out to my sides. The space was narrow. I couldn’t extend my arms to their full span. I felt a wall on one side and something I took to be a shelf. I pushed myself up until I was standing.
Then I heard something. Something moving. Something shuffling. In the dark closet with me. I thought of the bogeyman we had seen in the corridor. Worse, I thought of the fog creatures. Being stuck in a confined space with one or more of those couldn’t be good. Not good at all.
“Who are you?” The voice was a tad timid but wore a veneer of bravery.
“Chad?”
“Is that a question or an answer?”
Yep, Chad. “It’s me, Tank.”
“Good to hear, Big Guy.”
“Do you know where we are?” I wished for my flashlight. No telling where that was now.
“Oh, yeah, I know. I remember the smell.” He sniffed. His voice was a little wonky.
That’s when it hit me. “The closet?”
A sob. “Yes. Same closet.” He wasn’t hysterical, but he was zeroing in on it.
“Okay, okay. No problem.” I took a breath. I was getting a little claustrophobic myself.
“I hate closets. I’ve spent way too much time in them.”
“What does that mean?”
The sobs came in rapid succession. I was beginning to feel his panic. “My old man, moron. He used to lock me in closets. Sometimes for days at a time.”
Before I could respond I felt his hands on my arms pushing me back. “I’ve got to get out of here. I’m losing my mind. You—you’re breathing all my air.” His voice softened. “Please, Daddy, I’ll be good. I promise. I’ll be good.”
“Easy, Chad. I’ll have us out in a couple o’ moments. Just take a deep breath and—”
The punch hit me in the gut and it was hard enough to knock the air out of me. When I first met him we had tussled, so I knew he had decent strength, but the punch was harder than I thought him capable of. My stomach hurt, my head pounded, I was on edge, and I had had all I wanted of this ship. No way was I gonna let this guy wail on me.
I reached forward, felt cloth in my hand and guessed I had him by the front of the shirt, I pulled him forward then slammed him back. It sounded like I had just rammed the guy into some shelves. That had to hurt.
I clinched a fist, pulled it back. I had a good idea where his face was and I was gonna tenderize it. After setting my feet I started to let the punch fly.
But I didn’t.
I stopped before my fist moved an inch. This wasn’t right. I may not remember who I am, but this seemed way outta character for me. This was the second time I felt this. New emotions flooded my brain and my heart. Anger gave way to pity and a truckload of conviction landed on me.
I lowered my fist. “Ease up, Chad. Give me one minute and I’ll have us outta here.”
“Really?” Man, he could be snide. “How are you going to do that?”
“How did I get you out last time?”
“You’re going to kick the door down from in here.”
“You know something, Chad? For a smart guy, you can be really dumb.” I reached forward and found the door, then ran my hand slowly down the side of it until I felt shredded bits of wood. “I don’t need to kick anything down. The door is still broken.”
The door swung open easily enough. “Viola!” I moved into the dim hall. A half-sec later, Chad was out of the closet and looked like a man who had just crawled free from a coffin.
He looked at me. “Um, listen. About what happened in there…”
“Forget about it.”
“Maybe it could be our little secret—”
His eyes went wide and his mouth went slack. That could only mean one thing: something butt-ugly was standing behind me. I turned.
There are times when I hate being right.
A man stood behind me. Sorta a man. He was taller than me by a foot and a whole lot uglier. His face was misshaped, as if it had been made of wax and held under a hair dryer. He had a black mustache covering about half of his upper lip and one eye was twice the size of the other.
For a moment, I thought my heart had just given up and stopped. But since I didn’t drop over dead, I figured it was still working some.
“No, Daddy. Please no. Leave me alone. Leave—”
Chad was on the run. I glanced his way, then looked back at the meanest dad I had ever seen. Except he had disappeared.
My brain lit on fire while my blood ran cold. If I weren’t so terrified and worried, I mighta stopped to figure how that worked. I didn’t take the time. An image splashed on my mind: Chad racing up the stairs and onto the main deck—the place where we saw a thick fog full of round-headed, sharp toothed monstrosities. That image was replaced with one of a dead, gutted Chad dead on the deck. He was outta of his mind with fear and I was the only one who knew what or who stood a chance of catching him.
I stopped thinking and started running. Running down the corridor to the spot where the big bogey man had been; running up the stairs where we found Brenda; running onto the deck where we had seen and barely escaped the creepies in the fog.
The door to the deck had just closed when I reached it. Then I did the dumbest thing in my life, I charged outside without a thought. It might have been brave, but it was also tempting fate. Maybe even tempting God.
I balled my fists so tight I could feel tendons strain against bone. I had no plan, no scheme, just a goal: find Chad and drag his fanny back inside before he became monster chow.
Three steps outside the door, I paused long enough to notice that the fog was gone and with it the infestation it carried. That was good. Everything was still a dull gray and I could see fog in the distance, but for now the fog-sharks wouldn’t be jumping on deck anytime soon. Now I needed to find Chad before his terror drove him to do something stupid.
I asked God for help. I pleaded with God. I begged him. The prayer came naturally to me and felt familiar. Apparently, I was used to walking on hallowed ground.
Which way to go? I chose forward. We had walked that way earlier, so there was a chance Chad would choose the familiar.
My feet pounded the deck. My breathing came in great gulps. My mind ran to Andi and Brenda. Mostly it ran to Daniel. My fear felt like an animal with long tentacles was taking hold of my guts, my stomach, my heart and lungs. I could feel it moving, wriggling, churning.
Chad. Find Chad. Focus. Focus.
Most people paid little attention to me, once they got used to my size. I have never been the smartest guy in the room, but I have my insights and knew I could only chase down one lost sheep at a time. Still, I worried about the others.
The thing in my gut tugged at my innards some more. It was as if my fear had come alive.
No matter. I had my mission. I had my goal. Find that smart-mouthed, egotistical, chucklehead and save his bacon if I could. I might fail, but it wouldn’t be for the lack of trying.
I pressed on, glancing into windows, looking up to the higher decks where I could, but no Chad. Then I reached the bow.
And there was Chad—straddling the safety rail that ran around the ship. Except here it wasn’t a rail made of tubular steel. It was more of a parapet with a wood cap over a short steel wall.
A moment’s relief. He was still alive. Then more tension and fear when I realized he wasn’t taking a break but giving some serious thought to going over the edge.
I slowed to a walk, but continued forward. To my right was the wall that enclosed a room we hadn’t been in.
“Chad. Dude. Whatcha doing? That doesn’t look all that safe.”
He ignored me. He didn’t even bother to look at me. Something else held his attention. I
reached the open deck of the bow and to my right stood the focus of Chad’s attention: his father. Uglier than before and twice the size any man should be. One eye was now the size of a saucer and the other, although closer to the correct size for a guy standing twelve feet tall or so, oozed something milky-white. His face was even more twisted and his skin was almost see through. I could see things crawling just beneath the surface.
No wonder Chad was considering taking a dive. For a moment I considered doing a swan dive over the edge myself. If I could have put the guy down right then and there, he would still win. I’d be seeing him in every dream from now till heaven.
“Leave me alone, Dad. I haven’t done anything to you. Why do you hate me? Why?” Chad broke into tears.
Dad raised a hand and pointed over the bow, encouraging Chad to jump.
“Look at me, Chad.” I tried to sound calm although a hurricane of emotion raged within me.
Nothing.
“Chad!” My voice echoed off the hard surfaces and rolled over the water. “I said look at me.”
He turned his face my direction. His expression nearly broke me. His face showed a lifetime of hurt, of pain, of rejection.
“Help me, Tank.”
I could barely hear him. That’s when I noticed the blood. It ran from his nose and a nasty cut on his right cheek and right half of his forehead. I noticed some blood on the one hand I could see. My guess: he had tripped while running and did a header into a bulkhead or into the deck.
Chad turned his attention to the ghoul he called Dad. Then he leaned a little more over the edge.
“Don’t do it, Chad.”
“It’s the only way out. Death. Blackness. Nothingness. That’s better than this.”
“What if death isn’t the end, Chad?”
He didn’t respond other than tipping a few more inches toward certain death.
“Chad, I’m here. I’ll stand by you. I’ll stand with you. Just trust me.”
“You’ll stand against that?” He pointed at Dad. “No one can stand up to that.”